


can't die if you're already physically in hell

by sajere1



Category: Dimension 20, Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types, Fantasy High
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-22
Updated: 2019-05-22
Packaged: 2020-03-09 11:04:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18915667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sajere1/pseuds/sajere1
Summary: A demon crashes Sklonda Gukgak's re-marriage. This is, somehow, a great excuse for Riz to have Gay Thoughts.





	can't die if you're already physically in hell

“In my defense,” Riz says into the room’s taut silence, “I looked super badass.”

“I said shut _up_ , the Ball,” Fabian hisses. His hands are clumsy and untrained with Riz’s medical kit – never good at following directions, Fabian, or really good at following at all. Not for the first time, Riz feels a phantom twitch of his own hand doing the wrappings himself. Except that his hand is currently detached completely from his arm, instead lying in the guts of the demon corpse in the corner of the battered room, and that’s all still kind of Yikes to think about and the ghost feeling of a hand that isn’t actually there anymore makes his stomach lurch, So. Fabian wrapping his stump-arm it is.

“I did,” Riz says. He wants to shut up, because that is the tactical thing to do when you have been teleported by an evil wedding crasher to what is probably hell. But he can’t. His mouth is all cotton and blood and he can still feel the burns where he jammed the barrel of his discharged gun against the open wound of his whole-ass wrist to cauterize it, and if he stops talking long enough to actually pay attention to that shit he’s just gonna black out, and his luck with death saves is historically abysmal. “I looked so cool. Pew pew, badass guns. Badass family. My family’s so badass.”

Fabian makes a strained sort of grunting sound. It’s kind of hilarious, watching him, curled up and small in the way that Fabian Amarais Seacaster never is. He’s hurt, too, in his own ways, but there was no roll of doom for him; just the regular scratches and bruises and near-fainting exhaustion. Which is just fine. Fabian in battle is very attractive, Riz thinks blearily, the way he doesn’t let himself think when Fabian is talking to his plus-one rich girl in the fifth pew and Riz is determinedly fussing over his mom’s wedding dress instead. He’s all movement and dynamics and brutality and excitement. Not calculated, like Riz is, with all the probability and math and bullshit going on at once. Just cool. Fabian’s so cool. “You’re so cool,” Riz slurs.

“Dear god, please don’t make me shove you in a locker when we get back.”

“You’re embaaarrassed.” Riz reaches up with his bad hand – well, his only hand now, so his good and bad hand, maybe, at once – to poke Fabian’s blushing cheek. Fabian swats it away without looking. Gentle, though. Even in his raw panic and flurry of battle, he’s so gentle, despite himself. “But it’s true. You’re cool. Like, the coolest.”

“Of course I am.”

“Damn right! Of course you are! You’re fucking – you’re Fabian Amarais Seacaster! You’re so cool!” Riz focuses on Fabian’s pained half-smile. It is much nicer than Fabian’s bandaging skills, which are atrocious. “And you’re also super kind and stuff. You got presents! Remember when you got us presents? That was sooo nice.”

“Did you get drunk before the ceremony?” Fabian asks. His shoulders are still tense as he finishes out what are as close to bandages as they’re getting until they can find Kristen – or, more likely, until Kristen finds them.

“Severe blood loss can inhibit the mental functions of, uh, of people who. Um.” Riz squints at the wall. “We learned this in medicine class. Hold on. It, uh….fuck. Yeah, sure, whatever, I’m like, anti-blood drunk. You know.”

“Well, please sober up.” Bandaging done, Fabian stands up slowly, wincing at the ache of his arm where the demon got a good slice in. His suit’s all torn up. It still looks really good on him, though, which seems unfair. Fabian should stop looking good in things. It’s very confusing and Riz has more important things to think about, and Fabian is making it really hard to think about those things.

“Ball?” Fabian snaps his fingers in front of Riz’s face. Riz blinks. Oh right. Time continues to pass and all that. “I said, do you think you can find a way out of here?”

Riz glances around. The room they’re in has no doors and one open, barred window, beyond which seems to be endless fiery plains. There are also, for some reason, a TV, two chairs, and a drawing tablet. Which, like. Man. Hell is weird. “Yyyyyeah,” Riz says, because he’s woozy and dizzy but he also is a stone cold badass that once ate a dragon so like, he’s probably got this. “Let me just – whoof.” He clings to one of the chairs as his legs wobble beneath him. Standing was a bad choice. He’s gonna own that mistake. “Give me, um, a second. Just, just two clicks. And then I’ll investigate. Just…”

Fabian catches him before he can collapse onto the floor entirely, pulling him up by the armpits and depositing him ( _gentle, always so gentle despite himself_ ) on the chair. “Riz,” Fabian says, his voice dropping a little of its breathy haughtiness to something more desperate, “buddy, I know it’s hard, but we gotta find out what’s happening. If anyone finds us like this, we’re toast.”

“I know,” Riz grumbles, flapping his hand to push Fabian away from him. “I know, I know, it’s important, I wanna un-ruin my mom’s wedding, I get it, just…just give me a sec.” Riz’s face and hand feel clammy, sweaty, his breath chattering. Hell is so fucking hot.

Fabian looks at him for a long, long moment. Just looks. It’s a weird feeling, because Riz looks at Fabian all of the time nowadays, has been looking since Fabian did that Thing with his hair at the end of sophomore year, but Fabian doesn’t look at Riz. No one looks at Riz. That’s the point. That’s why he’s a good investigator. Slip into a palimpsest, tear it up from the inside, get brought back out without any of his teammates even worrying about him. That’s his job, is to not be looked at, or worried about, or whatever.

“Fine,” Fabian finally says, and Riz doesn’t like that Fabian’s eyes are still on him. He just said it’s his job, Fabian. Fuck off please. “Alright. Just…take a few minutes. Okay? Take a minute. And then…we’ll decide what to do then.” Fabian runs a hand, frustrated, through his hair, because apparently Fabian knows exactly all of Riz’s teenage sexuality gymnastics and how to agitate them, before he pulls out the other chair and sits down himself.

It’s not fair, Riz thinks. That Fabian gets to be all fucking – pretty, and badass, and passionate, and arrogant, and kind. It’s not fair that he gets matched up with ultra-rich ultra-badass ultra-pretty rich girls his equally-rich equally-badass equally-gorgeous mom picks out for him, girls that Riz couldn’t even compete with if he could admit to himself he wanted to. Riz is a goblin who had to sell his old gun to afford even a shitty suit for his mom’s wedding, and no matter how far he stretches his arm he is always too short to reach what he wants. There is always going to be a hole shaped like a dad and a crystal and a babysitter and a bullet, and Fabian is always going to know his dad is kicking around killing the devil, and he’s always going to be beautiful and a jackass and funny and genuine and it’s not fair.

“Riz?” he hears Fabian say, in a panic, but it’s like it’s through sludge. Riz’s vision is half-faded. He can still kind of see Fabian’s expression, at least – panicked, eyebrows knit, with that stupid eyepatch. He’s looking at Riz. “Riz, hey, stay with me.”

“It’s not fair,” Riz slurs. “It’s not.”

His eyes close.

**Author's Note:**

> originally posted on my tumblr, @riz-gukgak. i will make this fandom get its own section on this damn website or i will give up trying


End file.
